but please pay attention. I want to do this right.”
He studied me, some of the boyishness fading away. “You’re full of surprises, Basilia.”
“Just Basi.”
“What about Basil?”
He must have hacked security. Unless Kyros repeated shit word for word. I ignored Gerome and edged the car out of the garage entrance. I waited until a string of cars had passed by—ignoring Gerome’s snigger—and pulled onto the one-way street. The right way.
“Indicate for three seconds before switching lanes,” he instructed, not watching the road. “Get over to the far left lane sometime in the next four blocks.”
His phone chimed and the vampire read the message, chuckling as he tapped out a reply.
I wasn’t going to ask what Kyros said. Not after last night.
I’d fallen asleep in the car and woke as he carried me to bed—after telling him not to touch me. What’s more, my hands had been bunched in his shirt and I knew for a fact I gave him a sleepy smile before realising who carried me.
Lucky I wasn’t a sleepwalker. Who could tell what I’d get up to?
Indicating for three seconds, I began to drift across the empty lanes. “Now what?”
“Stop!”
Shrieking, I slammed on the brakes. Except it wasn’t the brake. The car shot forward as I twisted on the wheel, panic choking me.
A hand whipped out to grip the wheel. The car steadied. After blitzing past another block, I had the presence of mind to take my foot off the accelerator and find the real brake.
“Indicate and pull over to the curb,” Gerome said.
Heart stuttering in my chest, I obeyed, managing not to scratch the hub caps.
“Put the hazard lights on when you stop where you’re not meant to,” the vampire explained, pushing a triangle button on the dashboard. “They’re like a pass. People assume you’re in trouble and can’t move. This way, you’ll always have a park.”
Foot still jammed down on the brake, I took a deep breath. A calming breath. Because I was calm. Totally, totally calm. “Why did you do that?”
His phone was out again. I listened to a recording of my shriek and the screech of tyres.
He’d staged a video for Kyros.
I was calm. I was— “You fucker.” Slamming both hands on the wheel, I grabbed for his phone. He placed a hand over my face and held the phone out of my reach.
I bit down on his finger as hard as I could. Judging by his face, my bite possessed the strength of a day-old puppy.
“You scared me!” I pulled back. “I thought I’d hit an old lady.”
“Well, I didn’t expect you to stomp on the accelerator. Turned out better than I could’ve hoped.”
I turned to face the front, scanning the road as my heart reined in a notch. “You said you’d take this seriously.”
Kyros’s brother didn’t glance up. “No, I didn’t. You said you had a feeling I wouldn’t. I’m proving you right.”
“How old are you? No, wait. Don’t answer that. Your mental age is evident.”
He didn’t take the bait. “For the record, you should know how to stop in a hurry. Every time I yell stop, indicate to the closest curb, slam on the brakes, and pull over as quickly as possible.”
“You’re not turning this into a game.” I withered, turning off the hazard lights and pulling out after a few cars.
“Stop,” he shouted.
Nope.
Gerome frowned at me. “I said stop.”
“Get fucked.”
He caught my eyes. His eyes blazed blue, and suddenly my mind wasn’t my own. My body didn’t belong to me.
“Stop,” he whispered.
My body obeyed, indicating, braking, and pulling over on autopilot. I pressed the hazard lights on and sat back.
A full minute passed before the fuzzy warmth in my head—the feeling that I was a bystander in my body—dissipated.
My hands shook on my lap. A tremble stirred my words. “What was that?”
On his phone again, the vampire glanced up. “Hmm? Compulsion.”
“No, it wasn’t. I’ve been compelled before.” I drew in a breath.
“Maybe you got lost in my eyes.” He winked.
“Last time the compulsion had to be permanent.”
He threw me a cool look. “We compel humans and young Vissimo with our eyes for anything temporary—humans already in our employ and the like. The weaker their emotional attachment to what we’re compelling them to do, the better, but there’s always a risk the human will recall being compelled, so we hardly ever do it to those not under blood compulsion.”
I tried to take that all in. “Why did you do that to me? That was horrible.”
The cloudiness of the temporary compulsion left me